Motor racing-McLaren more motivated than ever, says Dennis

By Alastair Himmer

FUJI, Japan, Oct 10 (Reuters) - Formula One leaders McLaren are more united and motivated than ever as the championship enters its final phase, team boss Ron Dennis said on Friday.

With Lewis Hamilton holding a seven-point lead in the drivers' standings and three races left, McLaren are chasing their ninth constructors' title and first in a decade this season.

Mindful of Hamilton's failure to finish the job last year when the British rookie allowed Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen to claw back a 17 point deficit in the final two races, Dennis backed McLaren to set the record straight.

"We're more together, more focused, more committed and more motivated than ever before," said Dennis after Friday's free practice at the Japanese Grand Prix.

"Whomever I talk to in our team I notice the same thing. There's a tremendous feeling of comradeship -- in our garage and in our hospitality units here at Fuji and of course back in Woking, in Brixworth and Stuttgart," he said, alluding to the McLaren and Mercedes factories.

Dennis has presided over seven of McLaren's eight team championships since his arrival in 1980 but was also at the sharp end of last year's damaging public feud between Hamilton and former team mate Fernando Alonso.

After watching 23-year-old Hamilton clock the third-fastest time in practice for Sunday's Japan race, scene of his superb win in the wet in 2007, Dennis said there would be no slip-ups this year.

"That comradeship, that will to win, will persist throughout this race weekend and throughout the final two weekends," he said."